The latest report from IPPR North considers how housing trends can influence economic performance at national, regional and local levels, and their impact on issues such as construction, household spending and labour market mobility. The authors recommend means of addressing key problems in the areas of planning, housing finance, land supply, and the regeneration of housing and neighbourhoods.

The purpose of this document from the European Commission is to launch a public consultation on the safety of tourism accommodation services. The objectives are to gather input from all relevant parties involved in the issue of tourism accommodation services with an aim to evaluate whether the issues outlined above are sufficiently and effectively addressed and whether there is evidence of new risks and whether the existing tools are adequate. This paper furthers asks about the level at which action would be most effective to usefully contribute to effective levels of safety for consumers. The paper would also seek help in quantifying these issues.

The UK Government remains committed to geological disposal as the right policy for the long-term, safe and secure management of higher activity radioactive waste. This document outlines an approach based on working with interested communities, beginning with two years of actions overseen by Government and intended to address issues that the public and stakeholders have told us are important to them.

The Building Control Performance Standards Advisory Group carried out a further review of the building control performance standards and supporting guidance in 2013, and the results of the review can be found in this document. The Building Control Performance Standards Advisory Group have endeavoured to simplify the structure, including reducing the number of standards. Also ensuring the guidance recognises current best practice, while anticipating future best practice in the sector and customer expectations.

Westminster City Council has published a response to an independent report into the prime residential property market in central London. The report provides the first detailed analysis of London’s ‘prime and super prime’ residential market and the impacts it has on housing in the capital.

To understand the drivers behind the decision to rent, and what families liked and disliked about the tenure, this research from the LSE reviewed the structural factors influencing the private rented sector in the four cities and interviewed 17 middle-income family tenants.

This report describes the activities which took place in the second year since the Games to build a lasting legacy across a number of commitments, namely sport and healthy living, the regeneration of east London, bringing communities together, the Paralympic legacy and economic growth.

The Campaign to Protect Rural England has launched a campaign in order to find suitable brownfield sites for housing in towns and cities. Anyone can nominate brownfield sites in their area that could be suitable for housing development in the future. All that is required is an image of the site (as simple as a quick snap on your smartphone) and an address of the site including the postcode and street address.

In August 2013, 60 Minutes ran a story on the Chinese housing bubble focusing on the existence of “ghost cities” across the country. Forensic Asia, a financial analysis group based out of Hong Kong, believes these large vacant urban areas are evidence of a coming market crisis. If realized, the scale of the situation could eclipse the Great Recession of 2008 resulting from the mass mortgage defaulting that occurred in the US. Stephen Roach (Yale Global Affairs) disagrees with this view highlighting that China has been rapidly transitioning from a rural to urbanized country unlike the US in 2008 which had a substantial proportion of their population in cities already. The question remains – will people actually flock to these modern ghost towns?

The latest Carbon Displacement Project report also flags the significant opportunity for collaboration between city governments and business to improve climate resilience. The benefits that business brings to cities, including jobs, tax revenue and services, are one of the drivers for cities to improve their climate resilience. Similarly, businesses are reliant on public infrastructure and environmental policies to support and guide their operations. This report shows how cooperation between cities and businesses leads to better resilience city-wide. Both sectors can benefit from a greater understanding of each other’s climate change risks, and companies can help reduce city-wide risks by embedding local adaptation needs within their business operations.